Sponsors (44)
The bill expands and standardizes arts education and strengthens CCDBG child-care training to improve access, quality, and evidence-based practice—benefiting students, educators, and vulnerable youth—while imposing meaningful new costs, reporting requirements, and potential trade-offs in funding and local flexibility.
Students—particularly those in high-poverty, low-income, and underserved schools—would gain expanded access to arts classes, sequenced arts curricula, and more afterschool/summer arts opportunities through strengthened partnerships and program supports.
Policymakers, districts, and schools would receive standardized data and restored NAEP arts measures plus state report-card transparency and peer-reviewed research, enabling better targeting of resources, evidence-based program design, and monitoring of equity gaps in arts education.
Teachers and prospective arts educators would benefit from increased professional development and clearer pathways to arts teacher certification, helping expand the arts educator pipeline and improve instruction.
States, school districts, child care providers, and taxpayers would face increased costs to implement expanded training, professional development, NAEP arts assessments, data collection, and program expansions—potentially requiring new funding.
Schools, districts (especially small/rural ones), 21st CCLC grantees, and state agencies would incur additional administrative, planning, and reporting burdens to meet new data, coordination, and training requirements.
If federal funding does not increase, redirecting existing funds to pay for expanded training, research, assessments, or arts programs could reduce resources for direct services such as child care subsidies or other district priorities.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Integrates arts education requirements into child care, K–12 plans, juvenile reentry programs, and federal education research and NAEP assessments.
Adds arts education priorities and requirements across federal child care, elementary and secondary education, juvenile justice reentry programming, and federal education research and assessment. The bill requires states and local education agencies to plan for, report on, and support arts instruction and teacher development; expands training requirements for early childhood providers to include arts-related program strategies; integrates arts into juvenile justice coordination and reentry services; and directs federal research centers and NAEP to collect and assess arts education data and effectiveness evidence. The changes amend existing authorizing statutes (Child Care and Development Block Grant Act, Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act, Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act, and federal education research/assessment law) to expand program purposes, reporting, professional development, allowable uses, and research/assessment obligations related to arts and arts integration.
Official title: To expand arts education, and for other purposes.
Introduced March 31, 2025 by Suzanne Bonamici · Last progress March 31, 2025